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MARK 13:29 ⎔ I ⎔ II ⎔ III ⎔ IV ⎔ V ⎔ VI ⎔ VII ⎔ VIII ⎔ IX ⎔ X
THE MIDDLE MOVIE ⎔ IX MIRROR MOVEMENTS
Generally speaking, there’s quite a few of what I call “mirror movements” in this section. These are instances where the camera does something very similar to another shot from another point in the film in the same location, or when a character retraces another character’s path, or when two characters move in opposite directions through the same space. In the section I did to highlight this phenomenon, I largely kept it to moments where the camera movements did the same or roughly the same kind of move (forwards and/or backwards) through the exact same room/space, since there’s so much repetition that is less obvious (like Jack being dragged into the pantry charts the opposite path as when Jack is stalking through the kitchen to kill Hallorann, but the scenes are shot radically differently). If I expanded the definition to include things like the slow zoom on screaming nightmare Jack’s face and shine-tripping Danny’s face, there would be quite a lot more stylistic repetition.
As of this writing I have 28 identified instances of mirror movements, and 12 of them have a component in Section IX. Instead of doing a complete analysis for each one, I’ll just post the images with the respective sections. And just bear in mind that I’m doing this to highlight my position that IX is like the middle square on the phi grid, the highway through which the other sections pass (to reach Section X, which replays Sections I-VIII backwards).
Section VIII – First Half: Danny’s first lesson
Section VIII – First Half: Wendy goes to fight Jack
Section VII – First Half: The Gold Room tour
I’ll just point out here that Jack’s entire two experiences with going to see Lloyd are shot almost identically.
Same with the two Lloyd scenes, which are relatively identical (though the slight changes are striking–like the lighting behind Lloyd going from an enclosure of light to a column of light, which probably speaks to how Lloyd at first mirrors most of Jack’s speech, then blocks his attempts at mirroring, as discussed in the mirror phrase analysis).
Section VIII – Back Half: Hallorann makes the third phone call
Every one of Hallorann’s calls is identical in terms of his movement through the room. Two happen in Section IX, one in Section VIII/X.
Section VII – First Half: The Suite 3 Tour
Section V – First Half: Wendy about to find Hallorann’s corpse
Section V – First Half: Wendy shining the Grady ghost
Section V – First Half: Wendy seeing dead Hallorann
Section I – Back half/Section II – First Half: The final zoom on photo Jack
So we’ve got numerous visual references to itself, VIII, VII, V, II, I and by default X. That leaves VI, IV, and III, and you could argue that Jack’s backward walk connects visually to Danny’s backward walk in Section IV/V. And you could argue that Jack’s stalk through the lobby to kill Hallorann (Section VI) bore a similarity to his rage walk to the ghostball, or that Danny’s first shine of REDRUM connects to the one he draws in Section VI, or that his shine of the bloodfall connects to the one Wendy sees in IV, but I would find those much, much looser than these.
Anyway, that would still leave Section III, to which I can’t see anything but the loosest connection. So it’s not a perfect hub for everything, but I think you can see it’s still a hive of repetitious, even mirror-like activity.
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EYE SCREAM 